Reflections on art, fitness, family, politics and literature that hit me like bricks as I chauffeur my children from place to place...

A pink taxi

March 29, 2012

Its 7pm @home

I don't take phone calls. The blackberry sits by my bedside, charging its battery, next to a pile of books I long to read. I am in the midst of chaos.

It is 7pm. The house looks like a train station and sounds like the floor of a stock market. I believe this is the time my kids actually grow, experience and learn the most. The first thing they experience is family dynamics. How to coexist with others under a busy roof. How to make themselves heard. How to express their feelings. How to diffuse their stress. How to make themselves "at home".

They are exhausted at this time and its now time to unwind, to prepare for bed. Dinner in the kitchen. There is always argument about the menu which always emphasises vegetables and protein, perhaps a random carbohydrate. I sit with them, incapable of eating with them lest I get indigestion while arguing. I read to them instead. They all listen, up till the eldest, even though its a children's book, tenth time revisited.

Bedtime stories will follow the showers and the last minute homework. I read in Arabic to the youngest and in French to the middle child. The child who isn't being read to will interrupt his sibling's quiet time intermittently. It is never quiet in this house at 7pm. Somewhere, on a night of good intentions, a violin practice can be heard.

The phone may ring. My mother has a question, or my sister in NewYorkCity is inquiring on her relatives in Dubai. I announce that I am extremely busy, that I am tutoring geology, that I have 2 kids in the bathtub, that the bedtime story hasn't been finished, that I am tucking them in bed, that I have to get ready for a dinner or function and I hate being late, that I plan on going to bed early.

13 comments:

7pm Dubai time is 10 am NYC time, and so while you enter the whirlwind of bedtime and stories with your kids, I have just dropped mine off at their respective schools, and setting out for the day......Time difference is such a strange concept, especially for two sisters whose hearts beat as one. Makes me think of that song "My heart is so jet lagged". No matter what time it is in Dubai, you are and will always be on my mind and in my thoughts....

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About Me

The pink taxi runs from 7 am to 7pm. It picks and drops off my 3 kids at school, ballet,judo, aikido, violin, climbing, riding, squash, basketball, skiing, skating, swim team, friends, grandparents and teachers. The car, not pink, but a black SUV, drives to Carrefour and Coop. To Club stretch for pilates and Aviation club for weekly workouts. It is driven by a woman who navigates on the radio, gets DJed by her 4 year old or sometimes quietly reflects. The thoughts are about politics, family, humor, literature, art or fitness. Sometimes they are excruciatingly longwinded, other times they are gossipy and hot.
I hope you will all enjoy!
Love,
PinkTaxiBlogger